As information moves from the traditional print formats to digital platforms and new media formats, the expectation of the public towards libraries is continuously being reshaped. The telling research in the 2015 Pew report titled Libraries at the Crossroads paints a complex portrait of disruption and aspiration that are emerging across public libraries in response to societal changes and global trends. Empirical evidence shows the traditional use of libraries experiencing a 13 per cent drop from 2012 to 2015 in terms of borrowing print books, and an 8 per cent drop in library users asking onsite librarians for help. At the same time, the report highlights increased number of library users who value libraries simply as a community place to sit and read, study or get access to digital media, lending strong support that the public is interested in library services that are relevant and relatable to the communities they serve. In short, the Pew Report shows that for public libraries to remain vital to communities, they should provide programmes to teach digital skills whilst also offering comfortable reading and working spaces (Horrigan, 2105).

Further, emerging technologies are resulting in societal changes that are influencing learning be- haviours as well as consumer expectations of products and services. With the rapid advancements and solutions derived from mobile technologies, we can easily appreciate that the power to retrieve almost any information and communicate in a thousand different ways resides in using a device that fits in a pocket (DeMers, 2016). The influence and impact of mobile phones, especially smartphones, are felt both in developed and developing countries. Studies on global smartphone penetration have shown marked increase. One report showed that within a timespan from 2013 to 2015, the median percentage across 21 emerging and developing countries using the Internet occasionally or owning a smartphone increased from 43 to 54 per cent (Poushter, 2016). Thus, increasingly, even in the library arena, the more IT-savvy library users would expect to be served where they are and not have to go to the physical libraries to have access to library services.

Recognising this phenomenon and its influence in its 2015 Trend Report, the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) highlighted that “new technologies will both expand and limit who has access to information”, and that the “global in- formation economy will be transformed by new technologies” in the upcoming years. At the last World Library Conference in 2017, incoming IFLA’s President Gloria Perez-Salmeron exhorted librarians and libraries across countries, saying that “our main task is being the gears of the motors for a real and visible change and the develop- ment of our society” (IFLA, 2017). In order to be these “motor gears”, it becomes inevitable that libraries will have to emerge from their traditional stance and change the paradigms of how service ought to serve needs. For example, libraries have to explore new ways of dealing with data, such as the use of analysis coupled with geospatial studies of library usage to provide more effective services. More than ever, libraries need to be proactive in repositioning and redesigning service and physical spaces to respond to the needs of the communities they serve, while balancing the need to cope with and possibly harness technological advancements to better their service reach. At the same time, libraries will also have to explore how they can help their users adapt better to a world that now commands the need to be multi-literate, where digital literacy is becoming just as important as reading literacy.

Many libraries, especially those in developed countries, are already responding to technological trends, exploring whether mobile devices and robotics can be used within and without library spaces to provide for new experiential library services. However, while libraries in developed countries are moving away from their traditional role of focusing on transactional services and the provision of reading materials, and towards the provision of digital services, with the focus on e-con- tent, most libraries, especially in developing countries are still grap- pling with their use of technology and their value and relevance to their communities.

Besides seeing technology as an enabler for library transformation, IFLA, the global voice of libraries, has made a call to action for libraries to play a proactive role in developing services that contribute towards the achievement of the United Nations (UN) 2030’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), providing libraries with a clear and defined purpose for its relevance and existence (IFLA, 2017). Libraries world- wide have been called upon to transform their services to support the SDGs, especially those that directly support the national development priorities of their respective countries. The role of libraries is validated by how universal literacy is being recognised in the vision of the UN 2030 Agenda. Its commitment to this is substantiated by further setting of targets, which state that the measure of the success of the SDGs includes providing access and equal opportunity to information for all, as well as providing public access to information and digital literacy. As libraries are all about improving the various literacy levels, it is critical that libraries around the world come together to contribute towards the SDGs, as well as their countries’ national priorities and ul- timately contribute towards improving the lives of their communities.

In developing countries, including those in Southeast Asia, librarians need to understand and align their services to their 21st century users’ learning behaviours, and repurpose their libraries so that users are at the centre of the change. The way forward for them is in adopting a revision of existing library strategies to augment the library’s core mission of access and inclusive opportunities with a digital strategy to improve their nation’s trans-literacy skillsets and instil lifelong learning in people.

Where then do the libraries of Southeast Asia stand when it comes to addressing the trans-literacy and reading needs of their library users? Scanning the progress of various Southeast Asian libraries, library systems in countries such as Singapore and Malaysia have placed more emphasis on improving digital literacy levels by investing in and enabling library technological innovations and services. However, not all Southeast Asian countries are similarly blessed. Although there is a general sense that it would be good to enable their libraries (and indirectly their users) with technological improvements, countries such as Myanmar and Vietnam are still challenged by basic bread-and-butter issues, such as limited funding resources and lack of capacity- building means. In this next section, we take a brief overview of the efforts made by the libraries in four countries.

Singapore
In Singapore, the National Library Board of Singapore (NLB) is the statutory board that oversees the management and operations of the National Library of Singapore, as well as a network of 26 public libraries across the island and the National Archives of Singapore (National Library Board Singapore, 2017). Since its establishment as a statutory board in 1996, NLB’s progress in transforming its libraries has caught the attention of many libraries worldwide. Its most significant contributions to the development in the library world was in 1998 when it pioneered the use of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology in the library’s circulation management and operations, enabling faster turnaround times to borrowing and returning library materials (National Library Board Singapore, 2017).

Since then, NLB has been frequently lauded as being a trailblazer of library innovations, such as the use of robotics to shelve books and placing virtual bookshelves at bus stops (Blakemore, 2016; Channel NewsAsia, 2016). In the past one year, the digital innovative progress of NLB’s public libraries includes having virtual bookshelves and digital learning spaces in its latest revamped public library, and establishing new learning spaces like makerspaces and cooking studios where tools, hardware and equipment like 3-D printers are available for creativity projects (Lee, 2018; Lee, 2017). However not all its progress is digitally inclined. Its cradle-to-grave approach to its library services, programmes and outreach gave rise to initiatives reaching out to every Singaporean throughout their lives, with signature pro- grammes such as the Early Literacy Library, Read@School (a school- based reading outreach), Read@Work, Silver Infocomm Junctions (IT literacy programmes for the elderly) and kidsREAD (a reading programme for disadvantaged children). In recent years, the NLB has stepped up its efforts to get more adults and seniors reading through its reading campaign, the National Reading Movement, launched in 2016 with the specific objective to encourage people, to “Read More, Read Widely and Read Together” (National Reading Movement, n.d.).

Malaysia
Resultant from its federal and state government system, Malaysia’s library network is tiered such that there is one national library, 331 state or municipal libraries, which serve as the public libraries of Malaysia, and a total of 1,121 rural libraries. The responsibilities for the rural libraries are split between the National Library of Malaysia (NLM), which manages 510 rural libraries and the respective state gov- ernments that oversee the collective balance of 611 rural libraries. In recent years, these rural libraries have been rebranded as Community Knowledge Centres to become hubs for community, social and recreational purposes (National Library of Malaysia, 2017). This improve- ment sees a high alignment to ensure that the libraries are relatable to the communities they serve, as contrasted to the findings from a 2014 study, where rural libraries were found to be focused on the provision of traditional library services (such as borrowing and returning) rather than responding to its community needs (Abu, 2014).